How To Do A Family Financial Assessment

Written by Jeff Williams


How To Do A Family Financial Assessment

Not starting a business with enough cash, known technically as being "undercapitalized", is probably second only to not researching your business concept as a major cause of small business failure. This outcome is usuallyrepparttar result of inadequate advance planning duringrepparttar 112660 pre-launch phase. First and foremost you must estimate what your family expenses are and how you will assure that your business income is sufficient to pay them. You should sit down with your family and honestly discussrepparttar 112661 minimum amount of moneyrepparttar 112662 household must have each month to provide security. Ask each member ofrepparttar 112663 family to offer one or two areas where some expense can be reduced.

In addition to knowing your living costs, you must also be brutally honest about your current debt situation. Duringrepparttar 112664 1990's many families found themselves taking on increased debt in order to just get by. If your family is one of them, you should be realistic about your ability to take on more financial responsibility. New businesses almost always require more money to keep them running thanrepparttar 112665 new owners estimate before starting. Remember: every dollar you must pay each month for credit card payments is a dollar not available to invest in marketing your new company.

To help you calculate your current family financial situation you should create a worksheet, which I call: My Current Financial Situation. Listed below arerepparttar 112666 categories to include. Some research among your household financial records may be required.

> Family Budget

Break your household expenses down into two groups:

- Fixed expenses. These are recurring expenses that don't change in dollar amount from month to month, such as your mortgage payment or auto loan payment. You may also be investing a fixed amount each month into a college savings plan.

The Conflict of Interest Game

Written by Ulli G. Niemann


Disgruntled investors are going after Wall Street once again, this time accusing one of investment bank Morgan-Stanley's high-tech mutual funds of making biased stock picks.

Recent lawsuits allegerepparttar Morgan Stanley Technology fund was influenced to buy and hold stocks of companies that delivered huge investment banking fees - or could potentially bring big business - torepparttar 112659 investment bank.

According torepparttar 112660 lawsuits,repparttar 112661 Morgan Stanley fund followedrepparttar 112662 biased recommendations ofrepparttar 112663 firm's analysts - decisions that have cost shareholders millions of dollars sincerepparttar 112664 portfolio's October 2000 inception.

The fund lost 48 percent in 2001 and was down another 50 percent duringrepparttar 112665 first nine months of 2002. While Morgan Stanley strongly deniedrepparttar 112666 allegations, I fail to see howrepparttar 112667 management ofrepparttar 112668 fund is somehow distinct fromrepparttar 112669 other divisions of Morgan Stanley. Ultimately, they all work forrepparttar 112670 same boss.

The suits further claim thatrepparttar 112671 tech fund failed to disclose thatrepparttar 112672 firm had investment banking ties with a number of companies whose stocks were part ofrepparttar 112673 portfolio. They also failed to reveal that those links could affectrepparttar 112674 fund's buy or sell calls.

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